Students and staff gathered together for the StudentShapers Symposium, which this year had a theme of ‘Supporting students beyond the curriculum’.
The StudentShaper event on 11 October included three project presentations and a lunch which provided an opportunity to reflect and celebrate success.
StudentShapers is Imperial’s partnership programme which is open to students within the College and is part of the Learning and Teaching Strategy. StudentShapers offers students the opportunity to undertake projects in partnership with staff to improve curricula, develop innovative teaching practices and make positive change to the student experience. It contributes to building an inclusive learning community in education at Imperial.
Promoting students’ academic success: evaluation of the BSc Medical Biosciences Academic and Study Skills (ASK) module using a student-centred approach.
Dr Manuela Mura, Rosanne Choong, Ekaterina Kirina and Isabella Schmidt-Cornelius partnered for this project.
The purpose of the project was to update and develop the current ASK (BMB Academic Skills) module content, structure and modality of delivery, focusing on areas that effectively support student learning and those that could be further expanded or updated. Up until now there had been limited student engagement with module material and the content had been based purely on teachers’ perspectives. Sub-teams were created that reviewed virtual content in MedLearn and also looked at how face to face activities could support students.
The Digital Learning team provided support on how to develop new material in MedLearn and staff shared their own experiences of teaching assessment and practical hurdles in the delivery of the module.
“Everyone contributed enthusiastically fuelling each other’s creativity, and we have achieved so much in such a short amount of time. It was a truly enjoyable experience!” Dr Manuela Mura
The new material can be used by academic tutors to support students experiencing study difficulties, it allows tutors to monitor student engagement and development of transferable skills, and importantly the skills give students the confidence to be more engaged in class and assessment.
Dr Manuela Mura said: ‘The StudentShapers project gave us the opportunity to have a safe space to share thoughts, problems, and ideas without barriers and hierarchies. Students’ insight and willingness to share their learning experience coupled with the strong motivation to make an impact on the wider student cohort was fundamental in shaping the BMB Academic Skills (ASK) module. Everyone contributed enthusiastically fuelling each other’s creativity, and we have achieved so much in such a short amount of time. It was a truly enjoyable experience!’
Professional Values and Behaviours: Developing professional identity in phase 1 medical students
Dr Rasha Mezher Sikafi partnered with Cate Goldwater Breheny and Eve O’Connell.
The partnership aimed to explore ways to improve professional identity formation in years 1-3 of the medical school course. It aimed to explore the challenges and areas of improvement of the current curriculum with space for innovative ideas.
The three main themes agreed on were: feedback on student perspectives for assessment and curriculum planning purposes, highlighting of a gap in the curriculum (leading to new resource development) and exploration of new areas affecting student identity formation, e.g industrial action and EDI.
“Our StudentShapers were true partners in designing and developing teaching resources across the curriculum. They were amazing to work with and gave a new and vital perspective which has shaped our approach to student learning and teaching as Faculty”. Dr Noreen Ryan
The project gave the students the opportunity to learn how to work with faculty as peers, how to stop second-guessing themselves and appreciate student perspective and dealing with the challenges of building teaching content in an engaging way.
Dr Noreen Ryan said: ‘Our StudentShapers Cate and Eve completed a summer project with us. They were true partners in designing and developing teaching resources across the curriculum. They were amazing to work with and gave a new and vital perspective which has shaped our approach to student learning and teaching as Faculty’.
Shaping learning analytics
Dr Camille Kandiko-Howson and Charlotte Whitaker partnered with Maryam Fetanat, Megha Goel and Varsha Otta.
The project aimed to provide reliable and accessible data about learners and their online behaviours and ensure these are available to academics, educators, staff and students. This resulted in the creation of a student-facing governance policy, planning for student consultations on learning analytics and dashboards of student data.
Dr Kandiko-Howson said ‘The Shaping Learning Analytics StudentShapers project encompassed insights gathered from students regarding the Imperial College Learning Analytics initiative. This involved the development of a student-friendly ethics policy draft and accompanying web design, ensuring better comprehension among students. The StudentShaper partners went beyond the original scope of the project, delving into their own data to make customised student-facing Engagement and Performance dashboards. Lastly, a detailed focus group plan was formulated to solicit additional feedback from students through consultations. Students took initiative in how to make learning analytics even more useful for students—further progressing the project. We are continuing the StudentShaper work in partnership with Nanyang Technological University this year’.
Dr Mike Streule said: ‘What was noticeable about all the projects was the strong collaborative relationship that developed between staff and student partners, breaking down barriers and allowing for a wonderfully creative project environment’.
https://www.imperial.ac.uk/news/248673/studentshapers-supporting-students-beyond-curriculum
